Psychosocial group intervention for patients with primary breast cancer: a randomised trial

To test the effectiveness of a psycho-educational group intervention to improve psychological distress measured by POMS TMD, Quality of Life measured by European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer (EORTC), the core and breast cancer module, Mental Adjustment measured by MAC and marital relationship measured by BLRI in women with primary breast cancer conducted 10 weeks after surgery. A secondary outcome was 4-year survival.

We randomly assigned 210 patients with primary breast cancer to a control or an intervention group. Patients in the intervention group were offered two weekly 6-h sessions of psycho-education and eight weekly 2-h sessions of group psychotherapy. All participants were followed up for Quality of Life, coping ability and social relations 1, 6 and 12 months after the intervention and on survival 4 years after surgical treatment.

No statistically significant effects of the intervention were found on any of the psychosocial questionnaire outcomes. There were not enough cases of death to analyse overall survival. The only statistically significant result was for patients who used anti depressive medication, for whom almost all measures improved over time, in both the control and intervention groups.

Psycho-education and group psychotherapy did not decrease psychological distress or increase Quality of Life, Mental Adjustment or improve marital relationship among patients with primary breast cancer.